Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to security devices, more specifically to security enclosures for surface mounted equipment.
Description of the Related Art
Equipment theft and theft of equipment components (particularly copper components) has become an increasing problem. In a typical theft thieves will strip air conditioning equipment of all the copper parts including tubing, destroying the equipment in the process. Experienced thieves can strip a ground or roof mounted air conditioning condenser of virtually all of the copper content in 5 minutes or less. The speed with which the equipment can be dismantled makes ordinary security measures such as alarm systems valueless because the thieves will be long gone before law enforcement personnel can reach the scene.
Due to the frequency and magnitude of losses, various devices have been proposed, described and in some cases sold. Many of these devices are based on the same basic approach, which is to enclose the equipment in a cage with openings for ventilation.
Prior art devices suffer from unique and common deficiencies. For example, prior art cages that are of sufficient strength to resist common burglar tools such as bolt cutters and wire cutters, are extremely heavy. When the construction is unitary (all 3 or 4 sides and a top welded or otherwise permanently secured together), they cannot be lifted by manpower alone. In some devices the cages are mounted on pivots so that they can be swung over the equipment and laid to rest on the roof substrate or, in the case of ground mounted equipment, they merely are laid on the ground. Even with the pivot mounts, the weight may be so great that it takes more than one person to pivot the cage out of the way for servicing or replacement of the equipment increasing the required number of workers which increases costs.
At the opposite extreme, where the cage is relatively light weight, it is common for thieves to merely pry the cage apart at the corners, or to use bolt cutters to cut through the bars forming the cage to expose at least one side of the equipment and provide access to remove the copper components. In some cases the lightweight bars telescope to make the enclosure adjustable to fit various sizes and shapes of equipment. Once one side of the cage is breeched, the remaining sides can be easily slipped apart. The motivation for such adjustable designs includes the fact that it is very expensive to buy the tooling to make multiple cages of different sizes. This is brought about by the fact that these designs do not lend themselves to low cost manufacturing techniques such as modern high speed cutting techniques including laser, water-jet or plasma cutters. The designs incorporating tubing also do not lend themselves to low cost forming techniques such as bending brakes. As a consequence it requires new tooling to make custom designs and cannot be accomplished by a mere programming change in computer aided manufacturing (CAM) software.
Another problem arises due to the necessity of locking the cage to the skid, in the case of roof mounted air conditioning equipment, or a concrete pad, in the case of ground mounted equipment. Typically, the locks used are conventional padlocks which are easily defeated with bolt cutters because the hasp of the lock is exposed.
In other cases, the thieves may find it easiest merely to unbolt the cage from its base. In many cases the bolts and nuts can be reached and removed by conventional tools. Where security fasteners are employed they typically require special tools that the owner must employ to remove the security fasteners. These tools are frequently misplaced between servicing intervals which results in inconvenience, delay and expense for the owner. For the thief most of these tools are readily available in the market place. Thieves frequently have these tools more readily at hand than does the owner.